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The Declaration of Political Independence

(This is poligirl writing on behalf of Voices on the Square, with my apologies to Thomas Jefferson)

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the citizen long guaranteed by our Constitution, a decent respect to the opinions of humankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to that separation.

We hold these truths to be self evident, that all humans are created equal, and that the People of the United States of America are endowed not only with certain unalienable rights, but also with certain rights and liberties given to them by the Founding Fathers via the Constitution of the country adopted at the birth of these United States, as well as via laws passed throughout the past 237 years. That to secure these rights and liberties, the Government has been instituted among people, deriving their power from the consent of the governed, and that whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the People to alter or abolish it.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that humankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Objective evinces a design to reduce the people under absolute Despotism, it is the people’s right, it is the people’s duty, to stand up to their Government and its allies - the Political Parties, and their Corporate, Banking, and Industry bedfellows - and strive to change the course being charted by them. Such has been the patient sufferance of the People of the United States; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter the ties that effectively bind them to their political captors. The history of our recent Government of the United States is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over the People. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

The Government and their allies in the two main political parties, have refused to Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

They have stonewalled and dallied, avoiding passing Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless watered down in order to please the Corporations, Moneychangers, and Big Industry that line their pockets.

They have bowed to the wants of the Corporations, Moneychangers, and Big Industry, and instead have made laws favorable to them and not the public at large.

They have neglected to truly investigate and prosecute those Corporations, Moneychangers, and Big Industry who have violated the Laws of this Nation and in some cases changed the Laws of this Nation to accommodate said violations.

They have haphazardly and cavalierly engaged in War-making with other countries and have fabricated the justifications for it.

They have persisted in the use of drones on civilians in several other countries with which we are not at War, and are leaving mounting civilian casualties in the wake of this usage of drones.

They have set up a sole arbiter to be able to deprive anyone, including citizens of this Nation, of Life, who makes these decisions in secret and without any checks or balances – no oversight whatsoever.

They have made it common practice to prosecute whistleblowers as opposed to investigating and prosecuting wrongdoers.

Instead of “promoting the general Welfare” as the preamble to the standing Constitution states, they have:

Codified a for-profit system of healthcare, failed to institute any real affordability controls, and guaranteed penalty to those who cannot afford to purchase it.

Deregulated industry in general and delegated remaining regulation to those friendly with the industry they are regulating.

Failed to institute a living wage thereby relegating working people to lives of indentured servitude and others to lives of steady and increasing poverty.

Aided the Corporations, Moneychangers, and Big Industry in outsourcing jobs.

Helped militarize civilian law enforcement and stood by while it was used, sometimes violently, against people simply exercising their rights.

They have effectively undermined the following Amendments in the Bill of Rights:

When journalists are shut up, shut out, arrested, or professionally smeared for doing their jobs, and the people have excessive limitations on the right to assemble in protest, and only those with power and financial means have a platform, the First Amendment is effectively dead.

When people are subject to warrantless wiretaps, data mining without consent, dragnet collection of all of their communications by Government regardless of whether Government is actively listening and reading them or not, and routinely have property seized while not involved in criminal activity, the Fourth Amendment is effectively dead.

When many citizens of countries around the world have been detained under a special designation meant to circumvent long standing laws and held for years without due process or any hope for release, when citizens remaining silent can be used as incriminating evidence against themselves, and anyone can be added to a secret assassination program list that exists without due process or oversight, the Fifth Amendment is dead.

When indefinite detention exists and trials can be held using secret evidence and witnesses not available to the defense, the Sixth Amendment is dead.

When indefinite detention and secret assassination programs exist without oversight or due process, the Eighth Amendment is dead.

In every stage of these Oppressions, we have Petitioned and attempted Assembly requesting Redress in the most humble terms; Our repeated Petitions and attempted Assemblies have been answered only by repeated injury and escalation of Oppression. A Government, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyranny, is unfit to be a Government of a free people and unfit to be considered a Democracy.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions of our Government, their Parties, and their Corporate, Banking, and Industry bedfellows. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their branches to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of our longstanding laws and traditions; we have appealed to their justice and magnanimity, and We have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the people of the United States of America, generally Assembled, and appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of Voices on the Square, solemnly publish and declare, That these people united in their Voices are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the Political Powers that be, and that all political connection between them, their Parties, and their Representatives, is and ought to be totally dissolved. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Voices, our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

We had a new declaration of independence. I ratify this new declaration poligirl. I sit in my house this 4th of July and hear the fake bombs go off. in my neighborhood. Not lethal in most cases, just the love of bowing shit up, big noise and scary reverberating bangs for what? To celebrate what? We do love to blow shit up. Fun. My cats are hovering by the basement door , I'm bummed out I don't like stimulated war noise that is celebrating our independence as a nation. Fake violence rumbling through my so called liberal urban neighborhood.. So I'm a kill joy, but what is joyful about the blowing off of simulated bombs rumbling through the night. The sounds of terror and fear not the bells of freedom ringing. Great post read it at dkos love it here and there. Thanks.

... two that are blase about it. The big grey cat was trying to work out whether it was necessary to go hide in the downstairs shelves, though the fireworks around here didn't get to loud that he was rattling the doorknob of the basement door to get someone to open it.

But the two younger and smaller cats were both like, "oh, there's a noise ~ is there actually something happening somewhere, I'm bored".